This patent document relates to a system to reinforce cindercrete, clay or other cementitious hollow core building blocks used in the construction of walls, building and other enclosures or enclosed spaces.
Many wall structures, typically no more than three stories in height are constructed of cementitious hollow core blocks. Wall structures for schools, industrial and commercial buildings, warehouses and other structures are commonly constructed from such building material. The hollow cores are filled with concrete, insulation or are left hollow.
Concern has arisen to the stability of structures constructed with hollow core blocks located in earth quake prone zones. Since the hollow core blocks are held together with only a cementitious mortar and this mortar is typically applied only along the top exterior perimeter of the block and the two vertical faces making the “hand-hold”, there is concern that seismic activity and the tremors such activity can create will collapse such rigid cementitious structures.
The inventor has proposed a solution to this problem in United States publication no. US 2009-0025333 published Jan. 29, 2009. According to this proposal, there is provided a method of stabilizing a building constructed with a wall made of stacked rows of hollow core blocks, the hollow core blocks having cores, by inserting reinforcing rods through the rows of hollow core blocks; and injecting expanding polymer resin into the hollow core blocks to fill the cores of the hollow core blocks.